Greetings from Hawaii! (after the fact)

I had intended to actually post some pictures and fun stories while we were in Hawaii, to gloat and whatnot, but didn't get around to it, since I was busy loafing on the beach and swimming and eating tropical fruit and hiking. So, we are back on the mainland now (North Dakota at present), so I'm finally getting around to posting.

By the way, we both survived the semester. Both of us did well in language classes, and I'm waiting to hear back on my Exegesis paper. Hopefully it will be graded by the time we get back from Vancouver in early June. Anyhoo, on the the stuff from Hawaii...

We visited the island of Kauai. There was an unexpected visit to Oahu as well... more on that later. Kauai was much more easy-going than Maui--still a lot of tourists, but a lot less ritzy and very friendly. It's a smaller island, but there's still lots of stuff to do.

Snorkeling and Swimming

We went snorkeling almost every day! There's such an amazing variety of sea life! I didn't spring for the underwater disposable camera this time, so you just have to believe me on this one. Keith enjoyed seeing the fish, but not having salt water in his mouth. I guess it takes getting used to. I got to swim with sea turtles! That was a major highlight.

Usually after swimming in the ocean, a rinse in the pool or hot tub was nice to get the salt off. Although a lot of other people had the same idea... the pools at our hotel had a very high salt and sand content!


Hiking

We went on two major hikes, and a number of shorter walks. The first hike was along the wild and rugged Na Pali Coastline, and up to a spectacular waterfall. It was amazing how hearty we felt because of the oxygen-rich rainforest air... until we ran out of water.

The path took us over spectacular headlands to a beach...






...then up through a forest where coffee trees were growing wild. We met some people along the trail who taught us how to gather coffee beans! We've yet to see if the beans we collected are any good.


At this point, we were extremely hot and sticky, so the waterfall and pool were most welcome. Dad looked for frogs while I got pummeled by the waterfall.



Our other hike was into the world's highest swamp, near Waimea Canyon. We experienced some of Kauai's famous red dirt, some fog, some small lizards sunning themselves on the path, and eventually a great view, albeit still a bit foggy! Keith and I tried to take the shorter, better trail back, but found out at the end of the trail that it came out at a 4 mile long 4-wheel-drive only road. Whoops. Our hike ended up being longer (and possibly muddier) than everyone else's.




We also went on a lovely walk down the coast near our hotel at Poipu Beach.


Boating

We took a catamaran along the Na Pali coast, which is not accessible by car. We went snorkeling, saw beautiful scenery and some interesting sea creatures (dolphins, sea turtles, and a shark), and (most of us) enjoyed the wild ride on the way back... sitting at the front of the boat was like constantly having buckets of water dumped over our heads! Unfortunately Dad got rather seasick...





Wildlife

In addition to an abundance of tropical fish, we saw spinner dolphins...



...sea turtles...


...lizards...


...a big nasty centipede...


...and... chickens?! A bunch of chicken coops blew open during a hurricane a few years ago, and they thrived in the wild. They were everywhere, even on the beach and on our porch.



We have a tradition of "frog hunting" while in Hawaii. A favorite evening activity for Colin and I when we were younger was to search for frogs in the garden of our hotel.


Cooking and Eating

This was a big part of our trip! Most of the time we made our own meals, using fresh, local ingredients. We started with a trip to the farmer's market, fighting the crowd for the freshest pineapples! We sometimes had a list, but often our menu would revolve around what was available at the market.



Sometimes unusual things were at the market, such as raw macadamia nuts in the shell. We quickly discovered that our kitchen was not very well equipped... no nutcracker! Dad and Colin improvised.


Keith was our grillmeister (as usual). Highlights were kalbi chicken, fresh fish (wahoo and mahi mahi), and grilled pineapple.


Our best/most elaborate meal featured mahi mahi with fruit salsa, grilled pineapple, purple coconut rice, grilled corn, and salad!


Colin and Dad picked wild strawberry guavas on a hike, which I made into jam.


Waikiki Detour

So, we thought we were leaving... but the plane on our flight from Honolulu to Seattle decided we would stay for a few more hours. I noted that we did not seem to be climbing... that was because the flaps refused to retract completely. So, we circled for a couple of hours in order to lighten the plane by dumping and burning off fuel (meanwhile we became more and more nervous, the more the pilot tried to reassure us), then returned to Honolulu. Due to what happened next, I would heartily recommend Hawaiian Airlines... They shuttled us to Waikiki Beach (here we are waiting for the shuttle) and fed us dinner at a hotel! Meanwhile, our plane got fixed.


We had several hours to wander around the beach.


Keith enjoyed the Banyan trees... and the Japanese tourists! All the signs were bilingual.


So, the second try (on the same plane) got us all the way home, albeit 11 hours later than expected. After a couple of days to recover (and can some of the pineapple we brought home), we set out for the geographical center of North America... more on that soon! :)

Taste of the World... and procrastination.

Right now I'm taking a break from writing my exegesis paper. It's going to become a great paper by tomorrow at 4:30. That means that from the present moment, I have almost exactly 24 hours. I'm upstairs at school, eating my wasabi cashews and pb and celery (the pb and cel go together, but not the cashews) and drinking my coffee, since they're not allowed in the library, but I really needed a boost in brainpower. I was writing great guns this morning, but I've definitely slowed down. I think I'm at about half my word-limit, with a little less than half of my content in. It's looking like I won't have to do too much cutting... this is good. There's nothing more frustrating that cutting major points out of your paper to reduce the word count.

It just so happens that our school, a lot of the population is from somewhere interesting. 40% are American (shocking, for a Canadian school!), 30% are Canadian, and 30% are from elsewhere in the world. In addition, a lot of the Americans and Canadians grew up in another country.

So... that means a potluck can be really fun! One of our favorite things about our school is meeting people from all around the world... and also learning to cook their food. We've especially learned a lot from Carla of the Jungle (she's from Brazil... and her house there is full of plants)...


...and also from Izumi of Japan's Great White North (she's from the island of Hokkaido).


I've learned a lovely way to prepare salmon with onions, miso paste, and mirin, and I am now able to assuage my ramen and/or udon cravings with a healthy vat of miso ramen or something like that. (I'm not talking about the icky packaged stuff that college students usually eat. When you eat ramen with meat and veggies and good noodles and miso broth, ramen cravings are pretty understandable...)

So anyway, we have this fun potluck every year called "Taste of the World": everyone brings their native food to share! I don't really feel that we Americans have much to offer in terms of "native food" since we borrowed from everyone else, and there are a lot of us, so, like last year, I joined Carla and the Latin American group!

Carla and I got together to cook all afternoon! We made feijoada, kale, and farofa, and also took some time off to drink Brazilian coffee out on the porch, since it was one of the first nice days this year (March 1).



Our table was the most popular again!



(Although I did particularly enjoy the hand-made spring rolls at the SE Asia table! Those were awesome! I guess I need to make friends with some more Malaysians and Singaporeans.)


Keith brought spam. Again. That's right, representin' the good ol' US of A. (Thanks to Keith's mommy for the can of spam and the recipe book.) The funny thing was, he wasn't the only one.


The wasabi cashews were delicious, by the way. Okay, enough procrastinating, and back to the library I go. Toodles!

Waiting to take a final.

My studying is done. I'm all set... and I really don't feel like getting out all my stuff to work on the paper that's due on Tuesday that I haven't started yet. So, I thought I would write a little message on my poor neglected blog. I have lots of interesting pictures and other such things that I could post, but it just hasn't happened. It's shaping up to be a busy summer, too... 3 classes (for a total of 5 credits, 2 of which will be for audit), TA for a Hebrew class (and Keith will be doing Greek), continuing to teach cello and plan worship services at church, while trying to get started on my thesis and going on vacation a couple of times. Yay! Oh well, it's all stuff I like, so hopefully it won't be too overwhelming.

When I got up this morning, I was surprised to see that it had snowed a couple of inches last night. It won't last, though, since it's a beautiful, sunny day. But, to prove that it is, in fact, spring here, here's a couple pictures from a recent walk in the park. Actually, it wasn't all that recent; it was over a month ago. It smells really good outside in the spring. I like to pet the daffodils. Sorry, random thoughts from one who spent all day yesterday translating some things from Isaiah from Hebrew into English. Isaiah, which you may know is mostly poetry, is not exactly easy to translate; weird vocab and whatnot. Okay, it's time to me to go take my final. Wish me luck!

The trash tree.

This showed up at school. Actually, it was not at all surprising, since several friends of ours were instigators. This "trash tree" is an artistic display of all the paper cups accumulated over the course of one week at school. It was intended to be an encouragement for the students to bring their own mugs to the coffee shop, or to use the mugs provided there. I think it made some difference, but both of us were frustrated at the conversations we overheard is the course of the next week, as students tried (in vain) to justify and defend why they did not use reusable cups. Sad. Not to make light of the situation... it's not easy to give up conveniences which save time.

It's Lent again, and I'm learning to plan ahead. Little by little, I'm trying to change destructive habits. This year, among other things, I gave up the drier. That means there's usually a load of laundry drying on the rack in the kitchen... since that's really the only place it fits... and since we only have one rack, and it takes a couple of days for stuff to dry in our basement apartment, we really need to plan ahead, and only do one load at a time! But really, it's a very small sacrifice. It's much nicer not to have to deal with two or three loads at once. I was actually inspired by my mom, who dries stuff on the rack inside, even in the winter. :)

Well, life is good. I think Lent is a time to form new habits. I really like this not-using-the-drier thing... maybe I'll keep it up!

p.s. Incidentally, this picture was taken on the day Keith wore his tux to school to advertise for his Latin class. Doesn't he look sharp? :)

Just an update.

Hi! I realized that I have not posted for a long time... Ilene probably thinks we're dead. We are not. We are just students, that's all. I wanted to do the "update" post today, since later today is "Taste of the World," and undoubtedly there will be pictures and stories to post.

So, what's up with us? School! I'm taking Hebrew and Exegesis this term. I've been busy translating lots of things from Hebrew to English, and it's a lot of fun! This is what I came here to do! During a moment of insanity on Wednesday, I thought maybe I would get an Old Testament degree when I'm done with my current degree... then I realized I would need three semesters of systematic theology. Never mind... I've been working with Psalm 2 for Exegesis class, and I'm really enjoying it. I just finished writing my proposal for my thesis! The end is in sight! I'll be writing on the use of instrumental music in worship, and preparing a series of worship services.

Keith is taking Greek, Hebrew, and a seminar on the book of Acts. He's done with his seminar paper, so he thinks he can coast until the end of the term (ha ha). He's also teaching a Latin class for interested students at our school.

I wanted to post some pictures a while ago. We went to North Dakota in January to visit the family and attend our nephew, Michael's baptism. He was born the day after we left on our last visit... They poured water on his head in the usual manner, and he cooed and smiled. It was very sweet. Most babies scream. Here he is at that moment with his godparents, James and Terry.


And here's the family. Both sides. EVERYONE was there.


Afterwards, Keith was holding Elizabeth, our niece, and she... um... urped. Keith found it amusing.



Anyway, I'll post more soon. There hasn't been much news. We get together with friends and talk about school. Very exciting.

Paperless Christmas Letter...

Merry Christmas from the Olsons!

We decided to go electronic this year to save paper...

Our year, once again, has been school, school, and more school. We’re still at Regent College, probably until spring of 2009. Keith is working towards a career teaching Latin, Greek, and the Bible at a private high school. Celia is expanding her knowledge of liturgy and worship, while studying Hebrew on the side; she will be starting her thesis this spring.

We had an exciting year—we went to Europe and Boston, and made trips to Seattle and the Midwest to spend time with our families. We became godparents to Elizabeth Ann, our niece, daughter of Keith’s sister, Sarah, and her husband, Nate. Please look further on our blog; there are many more pictures and stories from this year!

We had a wonderful time catching up with our friends in Europe. Traveling overseas helped us appreciate some things we take for granted in our own culture, for example free toilets (the sit-down kind), soap, and running water in public bathrooms. We wish, however, that wine and cheese were as delicious and cheap here as in France and Germany!

Recently, I (Celia) began work as a cello teacher and as a worship intern at our church. I teach three students who live in inner-city Vancouver. At church, I plan worship services and work with musicians in preparation for the services. Recently, I have been busy planning advent services, for which I wrote the litanies (responsive prayers) myself. This has been good training for my intended career, and a welcome chance to serve the community.

This last semester, I (Keith) have been translating the Christmas story from Luke in the original Greek. The thing about trying to read the Bible in a different language is that it makes you slow down, a lot. I could go on about several different things that stood out to me from this often heard story, but I'll just talk about one. Without diving too far into the Greek, we all know they put Jesus in a manger because there was no room in the inn. The Greek word for “inn” is the same word for the “dining hall” where Jesus had his last supper. I would not make too much of a deal that Luke uses the same word in both of these cases, but it is a subtle allusion that the foretold birth of the Messiah needs to be held with his foretold death and resurrection.

Blessings to you this Christmas and in the New Year!

Love, Keith and Celia

Some highlights from our year...

I threw in my lot with the Latin Americans at our school's "Taste of the World." Our table was by far the most popular!

We attended the baptism of our niece and goddaughter, Elizabeth Ann.

We spent four days hiking in Derbyshire, England!